Well, good morning church, it is great to be here with you all again on this beautiful Sunday morning. This is the best way to start any week, in the house of the Lord, with God’s people. If you are new here this morning, it is wonderful to have you here with us. We are a simple ministry, we simply teach through God’s Word, and currently, we are in the midst of a study of 1 Corinthians. This morning we are going to be starting Chapter 7 of 1 Corinthians if you want to make your way there.
Let’s pray, and we will get into it here.
So the message is entitled Sex, Marriage, and Singleness. I have heard many wonderful spiritually gifted men teach about marriage. I have heard pastors give incredible illustrations and talk about their own marriages, and they use spiritual overtones and touching clichés and heart-moving examples. But I am not like those pastors, I will admit that upfront.
When people ask me about my marriage, and how we have lasted this long, and how we keep the fire in our marriage. I can say Liz and I do a few things, and this is our formula, may not be as spiritual as others, but we pray a whole lot, we laugh a lot, we fight a lot, and my favorite part, we make up a lot. So perhaps not as inspiring as other marriages, but we are simple people, and believe it or not, we should have never been married this long. All the spiritual people in our lives told us we were a mess, we would never make it, we didn’t have stable enough lives, we were too damaged from our past, and we had too many issues. And maybe we will not make it, but even after 17 years, I still find myself very much in love with her, I am really turned on by her, and she is my best friend, most trusted friend, and I wouldn’t want to do life with anyone else.
I have read wonderful marriage books, I have sat through marriage seminars, and I have taught many marriage teachings. But sometimes I think we complicate things too much in the Church. God gave us His Word, and believe it or not, in God’s Word marriage is dealt with, and I find it fascinating that the marriage counsel in God’s Word is so simple.
For example, the Church has created a whole purity culture with its own language, and they don’t dare use worldly words like “dating.” No, they come up with more Church-sensitive terms, like “courting.” And there are people who make tons of money going from church to church doing purity seminars getting kids to make impossible promises, and putting standards and burdens upon the younger generation that were never meant to be there. So what does the Bible say about courting or dating? I can’t say that it says anything about it, the Church has taken it upon itself to create its own system on it all. Do you know what God’s instructions are?
Gen. 2:24 Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.
We put all kinds of stipulations today beyond this. It is simple, we are to find our lifelong mate, and be joined in marriage and we are to do life together. Some people read that verse, and they put a lot into it, “therefor after a man has received his college degree after a man or woman is established in their career after a man or woman has lived life to the max, then they can find their wife and become one flesh.”
We just complicate things too often, I am an advocate of young marriage, getting married in poverty, and you know what happens through the struggle. The godly couple will learn to work together, become one unit, as they build their life with the Lord, and from nothing, they acquire great gratitude toward the Lord as He begins to bring an increase to their lives.
So, this morning, we are going on to this topic of marriage, and I will tell you this, marriage God’s way is not as complicated or even over spiritualized as the Church has made it out to be today.
Biblical marriage is simple, I would even say the exciting and extraordinary marriage in many ways comes from very ordinary means. And I will tell you this, God never made it complicated, man did that.
As we will see this morning as Paul is writing to a culture much like many today. It was a patriarchal-driven society where women had very little rights. The world of Paul’s day as we discussed last time we were together, was built around the man’s needs, a visit to a brothel after work was as normal today as a man stopping off for a beer on the way home from work. It was no big deal for a man to use the prostitute for pleasure, and his wife was more of a social arrangement, and she was there really to breed with.
Today men and women use the computer or their phones to get sexually aroused, maybe not so much a brothel, but the same idea exists today.
Today the sex and porn industry in some estimates makes upwards of $97 Billion a year. Our society has been highly sexualized and one result of this is that marriage is viewed as a negative thing today, even boring and for an older generation. Like the Corinthian culture, we are very much hedonistic or a self-gratifying pleasure-seeking culture.
And as we will discuss, the sexual drive is real, it is God-given but designed to be enjoyed in the parameters of marriage as defined by God, between one man and one woman.
Now, of course, the sex drive is a powerful drive, this too serves a noble purpose, if Adam was not given a desire for his wife, and there would have been no generation to follow.
If this drive within mankind was not so powerful, we might find greater gratification in fishing or something else, and there would be no multiplication of the human race.
The drive is not bad in itself, just needs to be correctly used.
Now, loyalty especially in terms of a lifelong commitment in marriage in our culture often comes second to my own well-being and happiness. And like in Corinth the world's view on marriage has crept into the Church. Christians today have no problem even filing for divorce, for no other reason than, “I just want to do this for me.”
It is a terrible tragedy that has taken place. Understand something, every Christian marriage serves as a unique picture, it is a witness to the world, of Divine love, of Christ and His Church.
We will end this morning with this reality. But our marriages do not exist for us, like everything else in Christianity, it is not about us at all, we are serving a greater purpose in our commitment to one another. So let’s get into the text, and I will warn here, this is going to have an adult rating on the message.
But please do not get upset with me, the Apostle Paul said it, I am only teaching what he said. I personally am blessed by what he says, and as you all know, we are not the traditional church, we are simple and ordinary, and we are not clever enough to do this any other way than to read the text, and talk about it, and prayerfully hear from God through it.
8So verse 1 of Chapter 7…. Paul starts off with singleness… Principles of Marriage 7:1 Now concerning the things of which you wrote to me: It is good for a man not to touch a woman.
We see here a shift in Paul’s writing, In the first six Chapters, Paul was correcting the things that were reported to him from Cloe’s household regarding Church divisions, including Church discipline, lawsuits between Christians, and their sexual purity. Now it says that he is responding to the questions from a letter that he received from the Corinthian Church itself. And Paul will deal with several different issues within the Chapters to come, and here in this chapter, he deals with intimacy in the marriage bed and singleness. He starts off here with this instruction, “It is good for a man not to touch a woman.”
He deals with singleness first. It seems with the rampant sexual sins that were taking place in Corinth that they may have thought if these things were so wrong, a Christian might be able to be considered purer by abstaining from sexual activity altogether, even in marriage.
Remember Paul declared our bodies the Temple of the Holy Spirit. But Paul is not going to say abstaining from sex is the best way to deal with the perverse culture around them.
He says here that singleness is good, not better. And I will say that singleness is a calling by God, Paul will say more about this later. But if you are single here this morning, and you are not called to be single, and the thought of being single for the rest of your life just takes you to deep sadness, then I am willing to bet that you are not called to singleness.
Personally, the thought in my own life is debilitating, and it may sound cold to you, but if death ever takes my sweetheart, I could not remain single for too much longer. I have told my wife that, and she laughs at me, and says, “Well you better cope with singleness.
But it is a calling, and for those who are called to it, it is a good thing.
But Paul goes immediately into a “Nevertheless” here in verse 2… 2 Nevertheless, because of sexual immorality, let each man have his own wife, and let each woman have her own husband. Now, I want you to understand how revolutionary this is here, and understand something, no other person and belief system has done more to lift women up to a place of equality than Jesus and Christianity.
Paul is talking to the man and the woman equally, and it will get even more drastic as we continue on. This culture much like many cultures today was a Patriarchal society, and a woman’s needs were rarely considered. A man can have a wife and a concubine, and both were considered no more than property. Paul puts forth the Biblical idea of marriage, between one man and one woman, and this will be the only place where the sexual expressions are to be utilized.
Paul is giving practical ways to abstain from the temptations around them by keeping themselves pure in marriage. This applies very much to us in America today.
This is not a command for everyone to be married, but it is a command for those who are married to take the covenant seriously.
As I mentioned in our opening, God actually created us to be sexual beings, it is not a shameful topic, shame is only attached to it because of what Satan has done with it by perverting God’s design. And as mentioned in the last teaching, the Church has also brought shame to something that is so wonderful. If you are young and single here this morning, understand your sexual drive is not a sinful thing, it is a God-given drive. And you are too look forward to the day that you are joined to your husband or wife, where that activity is good and pure. This is a foundational principle, starting back at creation. God created His wonderful creation, and saw it, and said “it is Good.” But He got to one thing that was not good.
2:18-25 And the Lord God said, "It is not good that man should be alone; I will make him a helper comparable to him." 19 Out of the ground the Lord God formed every beast of the field and every bird of the air and brought them to Adam to see what he would call them. And whatever Adam called each living creature, that was its name. 20 So Adam gave names to all cattle, to the birds of the air, and to every beast of the field. But for Adam there was not found a helper comparable to him. 21 And the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall on Adam, and he slept, and He took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh in its place. 22 Then the rib which the Lord God had taken from man He made into a woman, and He brought her to the man. 23 And Adam said: "This is now bone of my bones And flesh of my flesh; She shall be called WOman, Because she was taken out of Man." 24 Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and they shall become one flesh. 25 And they were both naked, the man and his wife, and were not ashamed.
One day the young person is to leave behind, let go of all other relationships in their lives, and they are to become one with their spouse. It is the highest priority in our human relationships.
Some of you need to get your overbearing momma out of your marriages and separate.
Few things are more damaging to a marriage than having parents intervening in a place that God has not sanctioned.
If you are that momma, let them go and learn life. But this one flesh is the most intimate experience in our human existence.
It is the only place that this sexual experience is to be not only pursued but enjoyed. Yes, Sex is to be enjoyed, without guilt, without shame, Adam and Eve were both naked, and there was no shame.
They left the lights on! They were completely open with one another without fear or insecurity. Listen, I am not the skinny stud I once was when Liz and I met, her body and mine have changed, but not much. But in the context of a godly marriage, we still have a blast, and my attraction to her is beyond her body type. She is still attracted to me, we cannot even snuggle too long at night, because it always leads to something else. And this is the reality of the marriage bed, and listen I have done marriage counseling for some time, thankfully pastor Joe does it now mostly, he is really gifted in that area.
But I know when one partner in the relationship begins to lose interest in this part of their marriage, it creates immense problems. It is up there with that overbearing mother-in-law, and finances are when the married couple loses their intimacy.
Heb. 13:4 Marriage is honorable among all, and the bed undefiled, but fornicators and adulterers God will judge.
It is not only a good thing but an honorable thing to make love with one another. Now, unfortunately, some of you cannot even get excited because you have indulged in the extreme expressions of this world. Maybe you have wrecked your marriage bed because you are addicted to fantasies on a screen, you are lost in chasing illusions and your marriage bed is lost its allure.
That is unfortunate, but I know that you can be healed, I know that Jesus can restore this part of your marriage.
Paul speaks profoundly to this here, which really helps in this area. And, this is especially for you men here who look at the marriage bed as something that is solely for your gratification, Paul is going to teach how to have the greatest gratification.
And this reality will change your experience radically. Again Paul’s teaching here is radically against the Patriarchal driven ideas within the Corinthian culture, and it might even challenge your ideas as well.
3 Let the husband render to his wife the affection due her, and likewise also the wife to her husband. 4 The wife does not have authority over her own body, but the husband does. And likewise, the husband does not have authority over his own body, but the wife does. 5 Do not deprive one another except with consent for a time, that you may give yourselves to fasting and prayer; and come together again so that Satan does not tempt you because of your lack of self-control. 6 But I say this as a concession, not as a commandment.
This kind of thinking was very confrontational in Paul’s day, that sex would also be for the enjoyment of the wife, not just the man.
And it might be very confrontational to some of you men here this morning.
Here lies the secret to fireworks in the bedroom, men minister to your wife’s needs over your own. And women, do the same for him.
Do not approach the marriage bed selfishly and just for you to get something out of it.
Men when was the last time you even considered what she wanted and enjoyed?
And some of you more dominant women, maybe it has been a while since you even considered your man’s desires.
When you can understand the gift that you have in your spouse, out of the billions of people that have lived on this earth, God gave you one to experience this great pleasure with.
This one person God gave to you must be pretty special. Don’t let the distortions and perversions of this world ruin this part of your lives.
You have a lifetime to learn what the other enjoys, and to have the best experience here.
In our premarital counseling, my advice to every young man that comes through is this.
Find out what she likes, and use whatever means you can to fulfill her needs first.
Then take the two minutes you need for yourself. But really when she is enjoying it, you will have the greatest pleasure yourself.
But this is the most enriching experience, and no man will enjoy himself better, than when he knows that his wife is enjoying herself.
Now, the seasons of life change us all, and I always wondered why God did not make males and females the same in their drives.
It seems the young man through his 20s is peaked, and then the woman in her mid-thirties and forties finds her season.
And these instructions here show that sometimes when you don’t feel like it, that you are to serve your spouse’s needs. The instruction is not to deprive one another.
We are to die to ourselves if there are medical issues that prohibit this mandate, and your husband or wife has this need still, I believe that you are still to show the affection due to them, to meet their needs to the best of your ability.
Don’t just give up because something is not working on your part, get creative and be committed to showing affection however you can.
And sex should never be used as a tool to control and manipulate the other person. It is others-minded.
Paul says if you both agree for a time to abstain for spiritual reasons, to pray and fast, do it for only a short time.
And he is not commanding this, this is not an out for anyone who wants to spiritualize their reasons for not giving the affections that are due to their spouse. Don’t stay away too long or temptation will enter into your relationship.
Listen, I have heard ridiculous ideas and tirades about how sex is a distraction from God’s Work, it is a negative thing even in the Christian experience, I have heard legalistic ideas about sex and marriage.
But you all have just heard God’s Word on the matter, it is Good, it is to be enjoyed, and I would even say it should be done often and with great enthusiasm.
And they accuse Christianity of being prudish and boring, I don’t think so.
So Paul now goes back to the single person.
And listen, if you are married don’t look down on the single person as if you are superior and if you are single don’t look down on those who are married as though you were more pious.
They are two different callings and two different experiences.
So to those who are single Paul says…. 7 For I wish that all men were even as I myself. But each one has his own gift from God, one in this manner and another in that.
It is interesting that Paul is unmarried at this point. He was a Pharisee and possibly a member of the Sanhedrin at one point, and marriage was a requirement.
In the Jewish culture if you reached the age of 20 without marrying it was considered an unspiritual thing, so at one point Paul was probably married. We do not know if he was a widower or if his wife left him because of his Christian faith, losing her status in the Jewish community may have been too much for her liking.
Whatever happened, Paul is single at this point in his ministry.
And although Paul knew singleness was good for him, he would not impose it on everyone else.
The important principle here to keep in mind is the gift that one has from God, either being gifted to singleness or marriage.
It is important to know where we are gifted. For some of you, your singleness is no problem, you love your freedom to serve the Lord in whatever capacity you can.
You, single people, have the freedom to serve the Lord wherever He so desires.
They are simply two different realities.
We have a young man right now working here in the office, next year we are planning on bringing Elijah on as the youth pastor.
But he is single, and you know he really has owned that, and he comes alongside all of us married staff with kids and is a huge blessing to us in his singleness. Now, he has no desire or calling to singleness, he cannot wait to find a bride, in fact, we are taking applications, just see my wife.
But while he is single, he is really being a blessing to the ministry here.
One calling is not better than the other.
Paul has some more things for the single person to consider.
Verses 8-9 now…
8 But I say to the unmarried and to the widows: It is good for them if they remain even as I am; 9 but if they cannot exercise self-control, let them marry. For it is better to marry than to burn with passion.
Paul says here that is good to be single, some have claimed that he says it is better.
But you all can read it for yourselves this morning, he says it is good.
Later on, Paul will explain how this frees you up to serve the Lord differently in light of His soon return. Paul includes a few different groups, this is not just the young singles, also the widowed, and later he will speak to the divorced single, Paul says if you are gifted to remain celibate, then do so, don’t feel pressure to remarry.
Paul, however, inserts “But” and it is a big “but” to consider here.
If you cannot exercise self-control, it is better to marry.
Paul does state here that something is better than the other, it is better to marry than to remain single.
I fall in this category, I could not be single, because I have not been gifted with celibacy, Paul gives clear instructions.
Some of you may enjoy the celibate lifestyle and that may be something you are called to.
Of course, if you remarry, you are too remarry in the Lord, not an unbeliever.
Listen, if you are in an unmarried situation where you are cheating the system, you are burning for one another, and it might be time to get married.
Next, Paul is going to move to instructions on how Christians ought to approach extreme difficulties in marriage.
Let’s consider verses 10-16 now… Keep Your Marriage Vows
10 Now to the married I command, yet not I but the Lord: A wife is not to depart from her husband. 11 But even if she does depart, let her remain unmarried or be reconciled to her husband. And a husband is not to divorce his wife. 12 But to the rest I, not the Lord, say: If any brother has a wife who does not believe, and she is willing to live with him, let him not divorce her. 13 And a woman who has a husband who does not believe if he is willing to live with her, let her not divorce him. 14 For the unbelieving husband is sanctified by the wife, and the unbelieving wife is sanctified by the husband; otherwise your children would be unclean, but now they are holy. 15 But if the unbeliever departs, let him depart; a brother or a sister is not under bondage in such cases. But God has called us to peace. 16 For how do you know, O wife, whether you will save your husband? Or how do you know, O husband, whether you will save your wife?
So is divorce permissible for Christians?
Some of us before Christ were divorced, but now in Christ, are we permitted to divorce?
Outside of adultery, and even with that, forgiveness is the preferable way, but anything outside of the covenant being broken by adultery divorce is not permitted.
Of course, that is an unpopular viewpoint.
Now there are times with situations like physical abuse, that it is necessary and wise to separate. Anytime you are in danger, or your kids are in danger it is time to separate.
However, Paul even deals with the topic of being unequally yoked in marriage, if your spouse is not a believer.
Now, this seems like the Bible is very strict, and tries to be black and white when the world’s relationships are not always black and white.
Things get super complicated at times, and hard lines are very difficult to follow.
But the hard lines do not come from the Bible’s strict views on divorce, they come from God’s high view of marriage.
Marriage is a commitment that should not be altered or treated so casually as it is today.
It is a sacred union that is not revolved around my happiness or what I am getting out of it.
Paul explains here that this is a command from the Lord to the married couples, to never divorce.
But staying married at all costs, God will not recognize the separation, you are still married in His eyes.
A Christian couple is not to separate for any reason other than adultery as
Jesus states in…
Matt 19:9 "And I say to you, whoever divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another, commits adultery; and whoever marries her who is divorced commits adultery."
People try to make loopholes here, and claim the unfaithfulness is in other ways than sexual, and they justify divorce, but the scriptures are clear.
Then, with the believer being married to an unbeliever the union is still sacred by the one’s faith.
Your ministry to the unbeliever can be the very thing that saves their soul in the end.
Paul even mentions our children too will have salvation, at least until they come to the age of accountability.
Which may differ in each child… when they can make their own choice to follow Jesus or not.
Listen, if you are married to an unbeliever here this morning, and they want to stay married to you, Paul says that you are to remain married, and do so with faith and patience.
The believer is to minister to them in hopes that they come to salvation, or until they die or the unbeliever leaves the relationship.
Marriage is not something so flippant, and it serves as a picture of the holy union between Christ and the Church.
We collectively are the Bride of Christ, He is the Bridegroom that will one day, and one day soon come for His Bride.
Our marriages are a sacred testimony and witness to this world, they are a sermon that shows this wonderful romance between our Savior and us His Church.
Our marriages are not to be interrupted by separation or divorce.
The Christian marriage commitment works itself out in steadfast love that is not determined or altered by emotions or changes that take place in our relationships.
The commitment is unto death.
Now some of you here, maybe you are living two different lives, different beds, with different bank accounts, and you may even be in the same house and live separately.
You do not have a shared vision for your lives.
Maybe you have never been told and understood that in marriage you are supposed to be one.
Our culture kind of promotes this self-service kind of thinking in our marriages.
Paul used the marriage bed as one example in these verses, to lay out this principle that in marriage, in this Divine Oneness that we have with one another, we are to put the other person’s needs first.
You know in all my years of marriage counseling, I have never had a woman or man come in and say, “Oh they are just blessing me too much, Pastor tell them to stop putting my needs first.” Nope not once, because the couples that are doing that, are thriving.
The conflict that comes is when we look at our relationship as to how it benefits me, and not just for your sex life, but for all areas of your marriage seek out your partner’s wellbeing above your own, and you will light the fire again in your relationship.
Return to your first love, remember that first love.
Return to that first love, when you had no problem putting her needs first, or his needs first.
Our marriages find their ultimate fulfillment when we understand the ultimate picture that they were designed to have.
I just want to mention one more time the simplicity that God’s Word lays out in having a successful marriage. Remember man complicates it greatly.
Paul says in… Eph. 5:22-33 Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. 23 For the husband is head of the wife, as also Christ is head of the church; and He is the Savior of the body. 24 Therefore, just as the church is subject to Christ, so let the wives be to their own husbands in everything. 25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself for her, 26 that He might sanctify and cleanse her with the washing of water by the word, 27 that He might present her to Himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that she should be holy and without blemish. 28 So husbands ought to love their own wives as their own bodies; he who loves his wife loves himself. 29 For no one ever hated his own flesh but nourishes and cherishes it, just as the Lord does the church. 30 For we are members of His body, of His flesh, and of His bones. 31 "For this reason, a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh." 32 This is a great mystery, but I speak concerning Christ and the church. 33 Nevertheless let each one of you in particular so love his own wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband.
This profound mystery of marriage concerns Christ and the church.
Ladies, you are to respect your husband, you know this is what they respond to.
You want to get your man going, tell him how safe he makes you feel, how you appreciate that he works so hard for you, how strong he is.
If you are next to your husband, grab his arm right now. I guarantee that he just flexed, and what he is telling you, is that he is strong, here to protect you, to provide for you, that man you are sitting next to would not think twice to lay down his life to die for you a hero’s death.
This is the way God made him, and when you honor him, he will serve you and go to the moon and back for you.
He thrives on this.
You men have the greater expectation, in this picture of Christ and the Church, you are to lay down your life for her, to serve her, to lead her and your household.
Men you are called to love her… that is not easy for us men or we would not need this command.
Love her as you did in the beginning when you would sit and listen to her for hours when you would buy her flowers with your last ten bucks when you called her on each break that you had.
Love her, lay down your life for her as Jesus did, even if it is unto death.
Jesus sacrificed everything, gave up His rights as the Son of God, He never once exploited or took advantage of anyone, He emptied Himself on that cross, in order to meet the needs of others.
Husbands, you want your household to thrive, empty yourself and your own desires for the sake of her, and your children, and this covenant you have made before God.
The command for both husband and wife is to selflessly serve one another.
Don’t worry about what the other person is doing or not doing, you do what you are called to.
And if you are single here this morning, and maybe you are just waiting for your spouse to come along, or maybe you are called to be single, whatever it is serve the Lord while you can do so more fluently.
It is interesting to me, I have seen so many times, the single person finally finds contentment in their singleness, and they will say something like, “I am content in my calling as a single person,” and they might even start believing this is their calling longterm.
And it is when they are content to serve the Lord in whatever way He asks of them, then it seems sometimes almost immediately they find someone, and they enter into another calling, one with the reality of serving the Lord as a married couple.
To the single person, be patient, and in your waiting serve the Lord with a passion. Amen?
Let’s pray…
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